Chapter One - The Consumate Cat

Cougars
were roaming the Americas when humans crossed the Bering land
bridge from Asia 40,000 years ago.
They watched the Spanish conquer the Aztecs and the pilgrims land at
Plymouth Rock. The big cats prowled the banks of the
Mississippi,
Colorado, and
Amazon rivers. They crossed the high, windy passes of the Sierra
Nevada, the Rocky Mountains, and the Andes.
They witnessed the first Mormons arrive in Utah,
prospectors invade the California
gold fields, and gauchos herd cattle in
Argentina's pampas. From the
Canadian Yukon to the Straits of Magellan - over 110 degrees
latitude - and from the Atlantic to the Pacific, the cougar once laid
claim to the most extensive range of any land mammal in the Western
Hemisphere.(1)

That cougars can be found from sea level to 14,765
feet,(2) and survive in the
dense forests of the Pacific Northwest, the desert Southwest, and
Florida's Everglades, is testimony to the big cat's resilience and
adaptability. These qualities were put to the test as never before
when European explorers set foot in the
Americas
in the 14th century. Early colonists viewed the lion as a threat to
livestock, as a competitor for the New World's
abundant game, and most importantly, as the personification of the
savage and godless wilderness they meant to cleanse and civilize.
Their death sentence pronounced, cougars were hunted, trapped, and
shot on sight, and their habitat was stripped away as land was
cleared to make way for agriculture and new towns. Today, the lion's
known range in North America has been reduced to areas in the 12
western states, the Canadian provinces of
British Columbia
and Alberta, and a small remnant
population in southern
Florida. An increasing frequency of sightings
suggest that some populations may still survive in parts of the
eastern United
States and
Canada.(3)

THE CAT OF MANY NAMESBecause of their enormous range, cougars are known as
"the cat of
many names." Writer Claude T. Barnes listed 18 native South American,
and 25 native North American, and 40 English names.(4)

Because of their enormous range, cougars are known as
"the cat of
many names".

The cougar is listed in dictionaries under more names than any other
animal in the world.(5) The
Guarani Indians of Brazil called them cuguacuarana, which
French naturalist Georges Buffon corrupted into cougar.(6,7)Puma comes from Quichua, an Inca language, meaning "a
powerful animal."(6,8) To the
Cherokee of the southeastern United States the big cat was
Klandagi, "Lord of the Forest," while the Chickasaws called him
Koe-Ishto, or Ko-Icto, the
"Cat of God."(7) In Mexico they are
leopardo, to other
Spanish-Americans, el Leon.(6,7)

In 1500, Amerigo Vespucci was the first white man to sight and
record a cougar in the Western Hemisphere.
Vespucci, after whom the two American continents are named, was probing the coastline of
Nicaragua
when he saw what he described to be lions, probably because of their
similarity to the more familiar African lion.(8,9)
Two years later, on his fourth voyage to the New World,
Christopher Columbus saw "lions" along the beaches of what are now
Honduras and Nicaragua.(6,7,8)
The honor of being the first European to sight a "lion" in North
America fell to Alvar Nunez Caheza de Vaca, who in 1513, saw one near
the Florida Everglades.(8)

Tyger was another name used for the American
lion throughout the Carolinas, Georgia,
and Florida during the 15th and 16th
centuries.(7) Today, cougar,
mountain lion, and puma are the most common names used in the western
United Stares, while panther, painter, and catamount are more
frequently heard east of the Mississippi. Panther is
the Greek word for leopard; painter is an American colloquial term
for panther; and catamount is a New England
expression, meaning "cat-of-the-mountains."(10)
Biologists call it Felis
concolor, literally, "cat of one color." Throughout this book,
the names cougar, mountain lion, puma, and panther are used
interchangeably.

FROM WHENCE CAME CATS? The fossil record of felines is as filled
with mystery as today's cats themselves. Paleontologists and
biologists have traditionally relied upon fossils and differences in
physical structure of modem animals to map the evolution of a
particular species. This has proven difficult with cats for two
reasons: most ancestral cats occupied tropical forests, where the
conditions for the preservation of fossils is poor; and most of the
physical characteristics of cats are related to the capture of prey,
with the result that all felines are very similar in structure.(11) As a result, no less than five different hypotheses have been
offered to explain the relationships between the various groups and
subgroups of extinct and modern cats.(12)

While there are differing interpretations of the evolution of the
cat family (Felidae), a few facts are agreed upon. Modern and extinct
carnivores have a common ancestor called
Miacids. These primitive,
tree-dwelling carnivores lived in the forests of the Northern
Hemisphere 39 to 60 million years ago. Then, about 40 million years
ago, a burst of evolution and diversification produced the modern
families of carnivores. These new carnivores fall into two major
groups: a bear-like group (arctoids), consisting of modem
bears, seals, dogs, raccoons, pandas, badgers, skunks, weasels, and
their relatives; and a cat-like group (aeluroids), a lineage
including the cats, hyenas (yes, that's right), genets, civets, and
mongooses.(12)

The first cat-like carnivores to appear were the saber- tooth
cats, about 35 million years ago.(11)
The sabertooths became extinct about 10,000 years ago worldwide, at
the end of the last glaciation.(13) While the sabertooths met their demise, however, the modem
cats were evolving and diversifying. Ancestral pumas lived in
North America from three to one million years ago, with
modern pumas appearing about 100,000 years ago or less.(11)
The American lion had arrived.

THE FAMILY OF CATSJust as there is disagreement about where cats came from, there is
debate over how to classify the 37 species of cats that exist today.
I discovered no less than six different proposed classification
systems for Felidae during the research for this book. The Latin name
Felis concolor was
first given to the cougar in 1771 by Carolus Linneaus, the father of
taxonomy. (It was Linneaus who devised the binomial system for
describing and classifying plants and animals.)(8)

Today, scientists generally divide the cat family (Felidae) into
two groups, or genera: Panthera, the large roaring cats, and
Felis, the smaller purring cats.(11)
The ability to roar depends on the structure of the hyoid bone, to
which the muscles of the trachea (windpipe) and larynx (voicebox) are
attached. The tiger (Pantheratigris), African lion (Pantheraleo), leopard (Panrhera pardus), and jaguar (Panthera
onca) represent this group. Members of Felis possess the
ability to purr or make shrill, higher-pitched sounds. Of the seven
cat species in North America, only
the jaguar (Panther
onca) belongs to
Panthera. The other six - cougar (Felis concolor),
lynx (Lynx canadensis), bobcat (Lynxrufus), matav (Felis wiedii),
ocelot (Felis pardalis),
and jaguarundi (Felis yagouaroundi) - are purring cats and are
members of Felis.(14)The cougar is the largest of the purring cats.

A different approach to the evolutionary and taxonomic puzzle of
feline classification was taken recently through the application of
the new science of molecular evolution. By examining the rate of
change of the genes in the DNA molecules of different cat species.
biologist Stephen J. O'Brien and his colleagues revealed that the 37
species of modern cats evolved in three distinct lines. The earliest
branch occurred 12 million years ago and includes the seven species
of small South American cats (ocelot, jaguarundi, and others). The
second branching took place 8 to 20 million years ago and included
the domestic cat and five close relatives (Pallas's cat, sand cat,
and others). About 4 to 6 million years ago a third branch split and
gave rise to the middle-sized and large cats. The most recent split
(1.8 to 3.8 million years ago) divided the lynxes and the large cats.
This third line gave rise to 24 of the 37 species of living cats,
including the cougar, cheetah, and all big cats.(15)

The differences of these two classification systems are apparent
and are representative of the disagreement among experts. Some
biologists believe we have progressed as far as we can in our
understanding of feline taxonomy through the examination of museum
specimens, and that future answers lie in the study of behavior,
ecology, and genetics.(16) For
instance, a cheetah-like cat existed in North America less than a
million years ago, but was extinct by the end of the Pleistocene era
(10,000 years ago). It evolved in parallel with the modern African
cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus) and was similar in appearance;
however, it appears to have been more closely related to the living
cougar than to the cheetah.(11,13)
Resolving where cougars fit into the cat family would give us one
more piece of the puzzle of how the American lion came to be.

SUBSPECIES AND STATUS When a species is as broadly distributed as the cougar, regional
variations in physical appearance occur. For instance, mountain lions
from Alberta look somewhat different
than the Florida
panther, a fact that relates to the different geographic habitats in
which the lion lives.(17)
Wildlife taxonomists recognize these regional variations by dividing
Felisconcolor into some 26 subspecies or geographic races,
scattered across North and South America.(18)
This is similar to the different races or breeds of the domestic dog.
Edward A. Goldman, coauthor of the classic, The Puma: Mysterious
American Cat, explains
how the subspecies of cougar are classified: "The subspecies or
geographic races of the puma, like those of other animals, are based
on combinations of characters, including size, color, and details of
cranial [skull] and dental structure(6)
Twelve subspecies are recognized north of the border between the
United States and Mexico.(6,7,18)
(When writing the scientific name of a particular subspecies, such as
the cougar found in Colorado, the subspecies name follows the genus
and species. Thus, the
Colorado
cougar becomes Felis
concolor hippolestes or F.c.
hippolestes.)

The existence and status of the various subspecies of cougars in North America is the subject of heated debate among academics and wildlife professionals.

The existence and status of the various subspecies of cougars in
North America is the subject of heated debate among academics and wildlife
professionals. The two subspecies found in eastern North America, the
eastern panther (Felis concolor couguar) and the
Florida panther (F. c. coryi), are classified as endangered and fully
protected.(19) The Yuma puma
(F. c. browni), a subspecies found along the lower
Colorado River, is currently a candidate for listing as endangered.(20)
While cougar populations are considered to be healthy in many
parts of western North America, populations adjacent to rapidly
expanding urban areas are facing critical habitat loss. In southern
California
for example, mountain lions in the Santa
Monica
Mountains and Santa Ana Mountains
are fast losing ground to rampant residential development.

APPEARANCE AND SIZE The cougar is plain-colored like the African lion, but is of
slighter build with a head that is smaller in proportion to its body.
Male pumas do not have the distinctive mane and tufted tail of their
Old World cousins.(2) The
absence of a mane led to an early myth about mountain lions: Early
Dutch traders in New York
were puzzled that the lion skins they obtained were those of females
Only. They questioned Indian hunters and were assured that such
animals existed, but only in the most inaccessible mountainous
places, where it would be foolhardy to attempt to hunt them.(1)

Except for the smaller jaguarondi of Central and
South Americas, the cougar is the only plain-colored cat
in the Americas.(2)
The sides of the muzzle and the backs of the ears are dark brown or
black, while the chin, upper lip, chest, and belly are creamy white.(21)
Atop the small head sit a pair of short, rounded ears. The
cougar's long and heavy tail is perhaps its most distinctive feature.
Measuring almost two-thirds the length of the head and body,
it is tipped with
brown and black.

Cougars are the largest native North American cat except for the
slightly larger jaguar (Panthera onca), which is
occasionally found in the southwestern
United States.(22)
The sexes look alike, though males are 30 to 40 percent larger than
females.(23) The largest animals
are found in the northern and southern extremes of its range. Though
sizes vary greatly throughout the cat's geographic range, a typical
adult male will weigh 110 to 180 pounds and the female 80 to 130
pounds. Exceptional individuals have exceeded 200 pounds, but this is
rare. Males will measure 6 to 8 feet from nose to tail tip and
females 5 to 7 feet.(2)

In captivity, cougars have lived as long as 21 years.(24)
In the wild, the cats probably live only half as long. Lack of a
reliable way to determine a mountain lion's age makes exact
measurements difficult. In the wild, a 10-year-old lion is likely a
very old cat. Experts also disagree over which gender lives longer on
the average. Some think the added stress of raising kittens
guarantees female lions a shorter life. The lifespan of both sexes in
hunted populations is probably shorter.(25)
But, even in the absence of hunting, a short life span is to he
expected of a predator that faces the frequent hazards of feeding on
prey much larger than itself.

Chapter Index to Cougar: The American Lion

Written by Kevin Hansen in association with the Mountain Lion Foundation.

Start off by reading about the history of the cougar including the evolution of native cat species, the two dozen or so subspecies of cougars and their general appearance. Learn about their discovery in the western hemisphere by early explorers and the many names they have been given by different cultures.

Beginning from birth, this chapter covers the life span of a cougar. A dependent kitten will mature in about two years, disperse off to establish its own home range, breed with others in neighboring ranges, and perhaps live to ten years of age. Cougars struggle mightily to survive in the face of active threats, which have greater or lesser impact depending upon their stage of life.

Although cougars are adaptable and can survive any where that has cover and large prey, human hunting has limited them to the western portion in North America. The size and overlap of an individual's home range depends on its age and sex, and a cougar will use markings to define the borders. Get an in-depth look at their population dynamics and discover how far they will travel to find food.

A mountain lion's keen senses, muscular agility, and ability to adapt to almost any landscape and prey make it a successful hunter. Their walking stride, retractable claws and powerful jaw allow them to sneak through bushes undetected and quickly take down prey. Predators play an important role in the health of prey populations and studies have shown they do not significantly reduce the number of deer and elk in a region.

Cougars were admired by many Native American cultures, and commonly found in their spiritual beliefs and folklore. But when early European explorers arrived, cougars were seen as a threat and competition. From the late 1600's to mid 1900's, bounties were often paid to anyone who killed a cougar. As ranching increased so did predator control, and then along with sport hunting, cougars were wiped out in most of the United States.